Chapter 2 Primer

In that unmarked, silent void at the end of the western spiral arm of the Milky Way hangs a small, unnoticed yellow sun.Orbiting about 98 million miles away, orbits a completely insignificant blue-green asteroid.Ape-derived life forms on this planet are so startlingly primitive that they still think the digital watch is a pretty remarkable idea. There is - or was - a problem with this planet, and that is that most of its inhabitants are unhappy most of the time.Various solutions to this problem have been proposed, but most of them revolve around the movement of those little green pieces of paper - which is strange, because it is not actually the little green pieces of paper unhappy.

So, the problem still plagues the planet.Everyone feels uncomfortable, most of them downright miserable, even those with digital watches. But that's irrelevant to the story we're here to tell. Our story is about a terrible but foolish disaster and its consequences. At the same time the story is also about a book called, This is not a book on Earth, it has never been published on Earth, and until the terrible disaster happened, no one on Earth has seen it Or have heard of it. However, this is definitely a phenomenal book. In fact, it may be the most extraordinary book ever published by the great publishing houses of Ursa Minor—companies that, of course, no one on Earth has ever heard of.However, in many more open civilizations on the eastern rim of the galaxy, the great Encyclopedia Galactica has been replaced as the standard of all knowledge and wisdom.For, though lengthy and containing much false or at least inaccurate information, it surpasses the older and duller work in two vitally important respects.

One, it's slightly cheaper; two, it has the words "Don't Panic" written in large, friendly letters on its cover. But this story of that terrible and foolish Thursday, this story of the strange consequences of that catastrophe, this story of how those consequences were inextricably intertwined with this remarkable book, begins very simple. Its beginning is related to a house.